


Running

by Saziikins



Series: Family Ties [8]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gambling Addiction, M/M, Mentions of Death, Substance Abuse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-15
Updated: 2014-12-15
Packaged: 2018-03-01 16:15:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2779571
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Saziikins/pseuds/Saziikins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sherlock gets off the aeroplane after the Moriarty video is broadcast across London. And then he goes to Greg's.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Running

**Author's Note:**

> Set almost immediately after The End. See? That wasn't the end of the series after all ;-)
> 
> I envisage this is split into two parts, but with one more flashback story between the two. And then one final, concluding story. I think. I'm pretty sure that's how it will work, but I have dramatically changed the course of the series this evening so it may change.

It doesn’t matter how much you make a person smile. How much you make them laugh. It doesn’t matter how often you see their eyes light up. It doesn’t even matter how often you see them proud of you, adoring you, pleased to see you. It doesn’t matter how many times you see someone look at you like you’re the only other person in the world.

Because in the end, the only expression you remember is the one they make when they watch you leave.

It doesn’t make any difference if they expect it. It doesn’t make any difference if they want to leave too. It doesn’t make any difference if they know it’s for the best.

There’s still that expression. Sad brown eyes, stiff bottom lip before it trembles, before they let the pain in. Before they accept that pain is part of the human experience even when it feels as though it will never end.

Sherlock didn’t want to know a lot about the human experience. He tried to live outside it, sheltered from pain. He wanted to treat the world like an aquarium, to watch it through glass, observing, staring in. But never to be a part of it. Never to drown in the waves of emotion and sentiment. Never to swim with the others, who all seemed so sure of themselves. But inside they were all lost in the oceans. Too vast. Too dark. Too uncertain.

He’d seen the sad brown eyes and stiff bottom lip on Greg Lestrade’s face too many times.

He was only thankful he wasn’t there to see him cry the day he heard Sherlock had died after jumping from Bart’s. Mycroft informed Sherlock that he cried. That he had tried to keep the tears in, but they spilled out anyway.

Sherlock had seen him cry twice, the day his father had died and the day the twins were born. But he hated it both times.

When Greg went to Sherlock’s funeral, Sherlock heard that he didn’t say a word to anyone. Not that Sherlock would know for certain. At the same time a coffin without a body was being put in the ground, he had let himself into Greg’s home, wandering aimlessly from room to room. He wanted to leave a sign for him, so he wouldn’t cry again, not ever. And especially not over him.

He found a picture in Greg’s bedroom. There was Sherlock, lying across the sofa wearing a face of thunder. But there was Greg at his side, two babies in his arms, a soft expression on his face as he gazed at Sherlock, laughing. To this day, Sherlock had no idea why Greg had wanted to take that photograph. But taken it they had, the camera on the timer. And he’d framed it.

Sherlock had placed the frame down on the bed and turned the hooks until he could take the back off. He took out the picture and slid it into his coat pocket. He found a pad of yellow post-it notes and on it he drew a figure of eight.

A silent promise. To meet in the middle one day.

He took a deep breath, stroking the blue sheets on the bed. The bed he had been in, just a few weeks ago. Glancing down at the post-it note, he scrawled out six words beneath the figure of eight: _I will be back for you._

He slid the paper into the frame and put it back beside the bed.

Three years later, the post-it note was no longer there. It had a place hidden in Greg’s wallet, two additional words added to the bottom: _I promise._ But the photo in the frame now was one of Sherlock holding the twins, both just one years old at the time. He didn’t know Greg had taken the photograph. But he looked happy in it.

Sherlock rubbed his thumb against the glass. Less than 24 hours ago, he had been in this house telling Greg he was on his way to die. Now he was here again, wondering what message he could leave to make it better this time.

Sherlock looked up as the door opened. Greg stood there, his arms folded, eyebrows raised. “What you doing?” he asked. “Leaving me another post-it note? Don’t bother.”

Sherlock placed the frame down, taking a few seconds to gather himself. Finally he looked up at Greg. A receipt stuck out of his coat pocket with a logo with a globe on the top of it. The Globe Casino. So Greg’s way of dealing with Sherlock’s expected death was to return to gambling. And that made Sherlock’s heart hurt. “Remember how we met?” he asked.

Greg paused for a moment, wavering in the doorway as though he didn’t even belong in his own home. “Like I could forget,” he finally said.

Sherlock rubbed his hands together in an uncertain gesture. “We’re so much older," he said. "Sometimes I feel like my bones are cracking. I feel slower. They say that sports people know when it’s time to retire, they feel it in their bodies. That they’re done.”

Greg blinked. “Since when do you care what sports people say?”

“You care. You enjoy football and cricket and athletics. You don’t watch it often, because you don’t have the time, but you like it.”

Greg nodded. “Okay. I do, yeah.”

“Remember how we met?” Sherlock asked again.

“Sherlock…”

Sherlock held a hand out to stop him talking. “Remember how we met? Not _our_ version, the one we tell ourselves, the real version?”

Greg stared down at his feet. “Yeah, I do.”

“You’re ashamed of that memory.”

“It wasn’t pretty,” Greg muttered.

“No. No, it never is when you lose someone you care about.”

Greg took a few steps into the room, sitting down on the edge of the bed. He patted the spot beside him and Sherlock sat down. They both stared at the wall in front of them, covered in pictures of the twins. Pictures of Greg’s parents. Pictures of Greg and his sister, Jess.

“You went to the casino today,” Sherlock murmured. “How much did you put down?”

“A couple of hundred pounds.”

“Did you win?”

“No.”

“Did you go to the one in Leicester Square?”

“No,” Greg said with an amused snort. “No, I wouldn’t show my face there, not after your card-counting antics.”

“You made a very good partner,” Sherlock murmured, a wistful smile on his face. “Until you remembered your morals.”

“Worth it though, wasn’t it? Do you remember when we got back to mine? God, I’d never had sex so good.”

“I couldn’t forget,” Sherlock murmured.

“You stayed. When I got that phone call.” Greg shook his head. “I never figured it out, Sherlock. I never worked out why you stayed that night.”

“Your father had died.”

“You’d known me for what, about five hours?”

Sherlock nodded. “About that, yes.”

“Tell me our version. What did we say happened?”

“That we met in the casino at Leicester Square. When you were investigating drug use there and I was there getting thrown out for counting cards. That you arrested me and eventually let me go because you had no evidence.”

Greg frowned. “I used to think that version was better than the truth.”

“It made you sound like a good policeman. It made me sound like a criminal. I suppose it was easier to think that way. We’re more alike than we pretend.”

“Why did you stay that night?” Greg asked.

“For the same reason I keep coming back. You’re interesting.”

“Why are you here, Sherlock?”

Sherlock pressed his lips together for a moment. It was a loaded question. He wanted to a avoid a loaded answer. “You saw the videos of Moriarty,” he said. “I spent a few hours with Mycroft, but he was driving me round the bend. So I came here. I had intended to just… I don’t know what I intended. Not to stay.”

“It’s funny,” Greg said, his voice soft. “The only time you ever stayed, the only time I ever thought you were going to stay without bolting at any minute, was the first night we met. You barely knew me. But you… you stayed.”

“Your father died," Sherlock said again, because that was explanation enough. Greg's father had died. What else was he to do?

There was a heavy pause before Greg spoke again. “John, Mycroft, Molly, whoever else, I don’t know. They all reckon I did you a favour, Sherlock. They all think that I got you clean and gave you work and made you better. They’re wrong though, aren’t they? I mean, yeah, I didn’t encourage the drugs but I never expected you to get clean forever. They all think…”

“They think you’re perfect. Incorruptible. Clean.”

“They think I’m a good man.”

“You are,” Sherlock said, reaching out and resting his hand over Greg’s. “But you’re not so good that you make me think I’m bad.”

“Why are you here, Sherlock?”

Sherlock took a breath, tension keeping his body upright. His collarbone twinged in pain, more psychological than real. “I keep running,” he said, looking down at his knees. “I don’t want to run anymore.”

“Sherlock, what are you saying?”

“That I’m yours.” The words left his mouth before he had time to stop himself. But with a soft sigh, he realised he didn’t want to stop anymore. “If you’ll have me.”

“You only left me yesterday.”

Sherlock glanced at him. “But I came back,” he said.

Greg let out a shaky breath. “Remember how we met, Sherlock?”

“Tell me.”

Greg leaned towards him, whispering in his ear. “You said ‘trust me’. You said ‘would you like to play the best game of your life?’” Sherlock watched as Greg moved back, their eyes locked together.

“You said ‘yes’,” Sherlock whispered. “You said ‘show me’.”

“What happened, Sherlock?” Greg asked, his voice trembling. “When did the game stop being fun?”

Sherlock reached up and stroked his cheek. And for the first time since he’d known him, he wrapped his arms around Greg and held him to his chest.

**Author's Note:**

> To be continued.


End file.
